Data Analytics

Rockline Industries operated with a cumbersome manual data-collection process that left plant managers without real-time visibility into machine production, performance, and activity across their manufacturing cells. In process-intensive environments, the inability to quickly identify downtime causes, output variances, or equipment degradation directly erodes Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) — a critical metric for competitive manufacturers. Without accurate, timely data flowing from the plant floor, supervisors were reacting to problems after the fact rather than preventing them, limiting throughput and making continuous improvement initiatives difficult to sustain or measure.

Rockline Industries worked with Stone Technologies, a Rockwell Automation Information Solution Partner, to design and deploy a plant-floor analytics solution built on FactoryTalk Metrics software. The system replaced the manual data-collection process by automatically monitoring equipment across five manufacturing cells, capturing granular, real-time data on machine production rates, performance states, and activity events. Stone Technologies managed solution design and delivery, ensuring the implementation was tailored to Rockline's specific cell configurations and production workflows. FactoryTalk Metrics provided structured OEE tracking by breaking downtime and performance losses into categorized, actionable data — giving operators and managers a single, accurate view of what was happening on the floor at any given moment.

The deployment produced measurable gains across every manufacturing cell in scope. Each of the five cells demonstrated an OEE improvement of more than 20 percent compared to baseline performance under the prior system. Beyond the headline number, the shift from manual to automated data collection eliminated reporting lag, allowing teams to act on performance deviations in real time rather than after shifts ended. Throughput increased in parallel with OEE gains, reflecting both reduced unplanned downtime and improved asset utilization.

Key outcomes:

• >20% OEE increase across all 5 manufacturing cells
• Increased throughput at the cell level
• Replaced manual data collection with automated, real-time equipment monitoring

• Automating data collection is the prerequisite — without accurate, real-time equipment data, OEE improvement programs lack the foundation needed to identify and act on losses.
• Cell-level granularity drives accountability — tracking OEE at the individual manufacturing cell rather than the plant level makes performance gaps visible and actionable for operators.
• Partnering with a system integrator familiar with the platform (Stone Technologies in this case) accelerates deployment and reduces configuration risk.
• OEE gains and throughput gains are linked — improvements in availability and performance metrics translate directly to output, making the business case straightforward to quantify.